Newly installed in two Mogadishu hotels, members of the new Somalian government of president Abdi Qassem Salad Hassan and prime minister Ali Khalif Galyr, have already launched themselves into business with the tradesmen who supported them. Large quantities of Somalian bank notes, printed abroad, are beginning to be imported by businessmen close to the government which has acted for years as if it were the country’s central bank. A first consignment of these notes was already delivered last August (ION 917) to this same group of tradesmen to which Mohamed Deilaf, the cousin and supporter of president Salad Hassan belongs. However, a new arrival of Somalian bank notes at the end of October, pushed up the exchange rate of the shilling against the US dollar causing local discontentment. Irritated by these repercussions, the Somalian government has announced that it is to tighten it’s control in the future of any rash monetary initiatives planned by this group of businessmen.

Nevertheless, hoping to profit from funds from organizations within the United Nations and other donors that may finance reconstruction in Somalia, a number of ministers have already started to sign agreements with foreign investors, for which they have not, at present, the means to honor. It was as such that the minister of Mines, Water and Mineral Resources, Hassan Abshir Farah and his colleague at the Ministry of Agriculture, Yusuf Moalim Amin, signed numerous separate agreements on October 25 with Quentin T. Kelly, the managing director of the American company, WorldWater Corporation (based in Pennington, New Jersey). The agreements named this company the new Somalia government’s principal consultant and contractor for all water and energy supply programs for three years.

WorldWater is specialized in water pumps and solar energy apparatus designed for developing countries. But the company’s contract in Somalia covers all aspects of the supply of water and electricity (including pipe laying construction works and distribution in Mogadishu and the rest of the country) and could, according to the company's vice president, Anand Rangaran, represent a total of $50 million.

The problem is that the Somalian authorities have not the first cent to finance these projects. That, for WorldWater, is the painful part, given that the company had in 1998 already signed similar agreements with the war lords who at the time dominated Mogadishu (Ali Mahdi Mohamed, Hussein Aïdeed, Osman Ali "Ato"). These agreements were not concretized (ION 802 and 870), though WorldWater Corporation did dig some wells in Hargeisa (Somaliland).

Another sector that could well attract foreign companies now that Somalia has the semblance of a government is that of oil, both for supply and for prospection. Even so, Somalia is currently facing a shortage of oil based products for which the price doubled at the end of October.

According to information received by The Indian Ocean Newletter, representatives of TotalFinaElf have already approached the new Somalian authorities in Mogadishu. At the same time, the Djibouti businessman, Abdourahman Boreh (close to the Djibouti head of state Ismaël Omar Guelleh), has started to activate his networks in Somalia, where he has good contacts. He has already been involved in the importation of sugar with Mohamed Deilaf, and is associated with Ali Khalif Galyr, the Somalian prime minister through the telephone company, Somtel, which is based in Dubaï and operating in a number of Somalian towns. Abdourahman Boreh is at present believed to be in contact with representatives of the oil companies Shell and British Petroleum, hoping to convince them to enter in the Somalian market.